The sudden encounter before the Ark of the Covenant was beyond anything Willy and his group had expected, and the exact circumstances of the encounter were clearly beyond Hao Ren's expectations as well. After a jumble of startled exclamations, the first thing he did was stare fixedly at the richly dressed old man standing beside Willy—and at the black longsword in the man's hand.
The old man's demonic state was naturally eye-catching. After all, a two-meter-tall old man with solid muscles and a ribbonfish tattoo around his neck—which was actually a demonic sigil—was bizarre enough in itself. In Hao Ren's memories, only the bare-chested old mage Anthony could rival him in muscle. But what truly kept Hao Ren from looking away was the weapon in the old man's hand.
The pitch-black longsword was streaked with points of light, making it look like a fragment of the universe. No matter how he looked at it, it seemed terribly familiar. Its style was so distinctive that even if it were tossed into one of those cheap domestic web games where dragon-slaying sabers were given away with a click, it would at least be a server-exclusive item—the Godslaying Sword!!
Kalasios's startled cry snapped Hao Ren out of his daze. He turned his head. "Is this your pope?!"
"His Holiness August VII, the current pope of the Holy Domain..." Kalasios's eyes looked as though he were sleepwalking. "My mentor... How did you become like this?!"
"August?" A hoarse, sinister laugh came from the old man wielding the sword, utterly impossible to associate with the dignified and benevolent pope. "Heh heh... That soul did put up a stubborn resistance for quite some time, but under the call of the Great Lord, no mortal can continue resisting... The one standing before you now is the Great